Exciting news for online advertisers! Online advertising spend comes in at #1 in 2010, totaling $25.8 billion, closely followed by print publications at $25.7 billion. Many advertisers have shifted offline spend to new online campaigns, some even dabbling in social networking media buys. Advertisers are shifting offline dollars to campaigns that have more measureable results such as banner ads or email campaigns. Even more stunning forecasts are that online display spend will overtake search ads by 2014.

Will your site survive Google Instant Previews? I’m sure many publisher sites out there are full of rich content for SEO, banners to bring in extra revenue, Opt-in links here, contact us links there… Now Google users have the ability to see a small snapshot preview of your site before actually clicking through. So all of these “extras” could actually be hurting your chances of getting customers to land on your site and actually convert. Design is now number 1, your site better be clean and to the point. Clear out some of the banner ads, clean up your font and color choices to make your site cohesive. Have a catchy headline since this is about all your customers will be able to read from the snapshot.

Go check out your site today using Google Instant Preview and ask yourself if you would click through based on your snapshot!

Facebook is saying goodbye to banner ads supplied by Microsoft, and HELLO to more targeted ads. Internews.com reports, “Facebook, which counts nearly 400 million users, said its own display ads feature interactive aspects and can target viewers based on their personal information, making them better suited to its social networking service than Microsoft’s standard Web banner ads. Ad formats that feature social actions perform better and provide a better user experience since they are more consistent with the look and feel of Facebook,” the company said in a statement. This combination of targeting and social relevance is the primary driver behind the shift in strategy.”
This change will probably not affect Microcsoft, but it brings up a good question on taking control over your page and what the user experiences. Facebook is obviously concerned with the experience the consumer goes through, versus a deal they have with Microsoft. Is this something of the future where companies really pay attention to the consumer experience versus making the most money on the ads they choose to display? Leadpile has an ability to supply banner ads for it’s publishers, however a website owner caring about the consumer experience is something we are very much concerned with also. Consumer experience or make more money????? What is the answer you believe is right?

According to emarketer.com, 2009 is going to be the year of spending advertising dollars on online video.

US marketers responded on how they plan to spend their 2009 online marketing budgets.

Of the people surveyed, here is who plans on spending their budgets on what:

1.  Online video  (66.8%)

2.  Social media   (41.6%)

3.  Search    (34.1%)

4.  Podcasts/webcasts (32%)

5.  Rich media  (30.5%)

6.  Banner ads   (22.8%)

7.  Mobile  (17.4%)

8.  Other   (6.8%)

This shows that more than two-thirds of respondents said they would focus their budgets on online video in 2009. According to the article, “eMarketer estimates that spending on online video advertising will grow to $4.6 billion in 2013, representing a more than sevenfold increase from the $587 million spent on the format in 2008.”  Therefore, if you are not planning on doing any online video with your marketing campaigns, you might want to at least entertain the idea.  Leadpile Lead exchange is utilizing online video to educate the public on Leadpile. Take a look in YouTube and see for yourself. How will you try and utilize online video to help promote your company?  Time to start thinking about that.